


Give Me A Sign

by poetatertot



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: AFTG Winter Exchange 2018, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Past Abuse, Recovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-18
Updated: 2018-12-18
Packaged: 2019-09-21 19:08:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17048927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poetatertot/pseuds/poetatertot
Summary: In Baltimore’s aftermath—the aftermath of Neil’s past, the beginning of his future—memories continue to haunt. He has to remember now that he isn’t alone. He has the Foxes. He has a home.He has Andrew.





	Give Me A Sign

**Author's Note:**

> For Theo.
> 
> Although it's still the 17th here, I hope you can forgive this gift being slightly late! I wanted to make sure I got everything right and then.. got a bit carried away. I hope you enjoy it regardless!

The first week is a dream.

Their win against the Ravens is nothing short of a miracle. Neil knows that; he’s painfully aware of the Foxes’ shortcomings, of how they would have lost in several seconds less. Their championship is an exception, not the rule. They have to do better to keep their trophy.

Still, he savors their win all the same. 

Riko’s death is icing on a cake already decorated. The exhilaration of slipping the Moriyama noose sings in Neil’s veins for days, propelling him through their celebration party and days of class after that. Strangers congratulate him in the hallways; Neil sits in the library and finds himself smiling at nothing. The dust is finally, sweetly settled.

Then the nightmares begin.

He fumbles awake—fingers clawing at sheets, breath crushed in his lungs. His heartbeat pounds in his ears; he opens his mouth and forces air, choking on his own tongue.

_ You will always be a Wesninski at heart. _

He can’t outrun himself even in his dreams.

“Neil.  _ Neil. _ ” 

A shadow looms at the edge of his vision. Neil flinches on reflex, twisting back into the mattress. Every limb trembles violently. The chill of his own sweat clings to his nape with ugly claws.

The shadow leans back. Moonlight threads across a cheekbone, a mouth, a neck with fading marks.

Andrew.

He sits as far from Neil as he can without leaving the bed. In darkness his eyes are gleaming flint chips, stones that slide over Neil’s shuddering skin in careful, even strokes. His mouth is a flat line.

Neil sucks in a ragged breath. Tears prick at his eyelids; he blinks, letting them flow hot tracks down his cheeks. Everything inside him  _ burns.  _

“I’m—” He coughs, vocal chords chafing. “I’m fine.”

Andrew doesn’t say anything. He looks and looks, watching Neil flounder in wakefulness. The sharp line between his brows deepens.

“No,” he says. “You’re not.”

Riko’s ghost knives at Neil’s brain in sour, jagged punctures. He closes his eyes and wills it away.  _ I’m fine,  _ he thinks.  _ I’m fine.  _ His heart races a traitor rhythm, pounding loud enough to wake the whole world. His lungs ache. Thoughts trip and bump over each other in his head. 

Fingers curl at his neck—a hand, blessedly cool against feverish skin. Andrew’s palm presses his forehead to one shoulder, cradling gently beneath red curls.

“Breathe,” he demands. “Neil. Breathe.”

Neil stares blindly into his shirt; his ears strain, picking up the smooth rasp of even breathing.  _ In, out. In, out. _

He sucks in a deep breath. His lungs pinch painfully.

He lets it go.

And again. And again. Over and over they breathe together.  _ In, out. In, out. _

_ I’m safe,  _ Neil tells himself.  _ I’m safe.  _

Later, after Andrew’s gotten him water and Neil’s changed his clothes, they crawl back under the sheets. The moon splits over Andrew’s shoulder, outlining the rigid bones that hold back the shadows. Neil’s throat burns at the sight of him. 

“Thank you,” he whispers. 

Andrew says nothing, but one hand slips up the comforter to tuck around the shape of Neil’s neck. His fingers tap in time with Neil’s pulse.

Neil fears he won’t be able to sleep, but the rhythm washes him to stillness anyway.

.

Summer in Columbia means fresh food and sunlit couches, puffy clouds peeking in through wide glass windows. Neil and Andrew make the trip the second school ends. Kevin goes up to New England to visit Thea; Aaron drifts to visit Katelyn’s home. Nicky leaps across the pond to see Erik. 

It’s just them. Time ticks away between  _ now  _ and an indeterminate point where the future unfolds. Neil tries not to think about it; he has enough trouble not thinking about the past.

Kevin’s ghost haunts them in the form of real food. There’s ripe fruit in the bowl; fresh vegetables nest in the crisper. Neil eats his meals as balanced as he can lest Kevin comes back too soon.

Morning follows the same routine: waking up with the sun; slipping into his running shoes. Andrew grumbles and burritos himself deeper while Neil stretches his legs with the doves. He comes back washed in dew and opens the kitchen blinds for breakfast, tempting Andrew out of his blanket nest; they share eggs, smoothies, maybe even baked bread while the news rolls by on TV. 

It’s almost boring. Neil wouldn’t prefer it any other way.

He’s pulled out the blender and different fruits for a smoothie—strawberries and peaches, blueberries and raspberries. A strawberry rests in one hand; a knife raises, poised, in the other. He presses the edge to the strawberry’s green leaves, cutting away useless from useful.

The fruit’s juice oils his knife. The blade slips, spearing fruit flesh and sliding over the webbing of his left hand. Instantly, a vicious, hot sting shoots to his wrist. Blood begins to well.

He stops. 

Neil looks down at the cutting board. The coloring is wrong—too bright, too thin—but it bubbles and gleams just the same. The knife in his hand glints wicked-sharp; two shades mix and hang, droplets suspended from a razor-edge. 

The knife’s handle bites into his palm. Neil stares down at the smear of his own blood. 

It isn’t the first time this has happened. It won’t be the last.

_ Why? _

He stumbles backwards and bangs his knee against the table. He can’t feel it. His tongue hangs too-heavy in his mouth; acid burns his throat. He swallows and swallows, but he can’t get anything down.

_ Why now? _

The corners of Neil’s mind are alive with his own screaming. Vivid memories snake and strangle—wicked blades, bones and pulp, an alien tongue straining for freedom behind bloody teeth. 

_ Sorry, I’m sorry, please stop. stop. STOP—  _

He doesn’t see Andrew until he’s everywhere. Hands waver over his shoulders; hazel eyes pin him down. Neil focuses on the thin, flat line of his mouth. His lips are moving into shapes Neil should recognize but he  _ can’t.  _

“I’m—” His mouth gapes. Tight jaws give way to sore, aching chords. He coughs. “I’m—”

“Don’t,” Andrew snaps. 

They sit on the kitchen floor. Air scrapes Neil’s mouth; tears spring behind his eyes. Every limb aches, trembling, shaking. His insides burn.

Time passes. They sit. The light shifts across the tiles. 

Finally, Neil swallows.

“Sorry.”

Andrew’s eyes flit to his. He doesn’t speak.

“I’m not..” Neil blinks; swallows again, harder. It burns. “I’m fine now.”

Andrew moves to look at him— _ really  _ look, taking in every inch. His knuckles shift like stones under water, bones and tendons twitching as he takes in Neil’s bloody hand and hollow eyes, his bitten lips and sallow skin.

“No,” he says, calmly. “You’re not.”

Shame stings the back of Neil’s throat. He wants to scream; he wants to cry with frustration.  _ I’m doing my best,  _ he wants to say.  _ I don’t want this anymore than you do.  _ “I—”

“You don’t have to be.” 

Neil blinks. He opens his mouth; he closes it again. “What?”

“You don’t have to be fine,” Andrew repeats. He’s moved closer now, close enough that Neil can see every one of his eyelashes, golden and fine. “I will be here either way.”

They look at each other. Neil’s words bubble nonsensically and die before they reach his tongue. The lump in his throat swells to choke him.

“I’ll only say it once,” Andrew tells him. He kneels steady, hands braced on thighs; the sun turns his hair to candle brightness. “I won’t catch you, but I will be here as long as you say so. You have to give a sign.”

Neil lets out a breath. “You promise?” he whispers.

Andrew raises an eyebrow. “Didn’t I already?”

Neil can’t help it. He’s bleeding, shaking, scoured inside out—but he laughs anyway. 

.

Months pass in simple phases: turning pages, calendars, leaves. Summer swells to its humid pinnacle and crushes the Foxes beneath its fist. The sun rises and sets in crashing waves. The world narrows to a myriad of sensations: blacktop heat and sweat, damp cotton that clings too close to flushed, sunburned skin. 

Neil watches his skin turn pink, then brown. Andrew becomes lobster-red and stays that way. Between the two of them, thousands of freckles burst into being. 

The new school season appears on their doorstep before Neil is ready.

“September first,” Kevin says. His thumb leaves oily marks on  _ Exy Monthly.  _ “Already.”

Neil looks up from the TV. Andrew had turned on some family sitcom an hour ago; the living room, dark and drawn to keep out the sun, swells with laugh tracks and corny jokes. “What?”

“The first,” Kevin repeats. He presses their calendar back onto the fridge. “Classes are starting soon.”

Neil frowns. It isn’t that he’s forgotten to schedule himself, but that he can clearly remember doing so last year. A year’s already passed. 

The room is different; his roommates are different.  _ Neil  _ is different, but his past year clings to him with oily, clinging tendrils. 

Half of Palmetto University flows back overnight. Hallways suddenly crowd with mystery bodies—incoming freshman who don’t know better than to stare. Neil makes his run through campus and feels their gazes on his back, on his hair, on his scars. 

Everyone knows who he is by now, but the news dropping over summer doesn’t make his runs feel any less like walks of shame. 

_ Did you hear? _

_ Look at his scars. _

_ Something like mafia connections—  _

_ It’s him, he’s the son of the—  _

Neil doesn’t mean to run up three flights, but suddenly he’s bursting through his apartment door. Andrew looks up from where he’s busted out the screen to smoke. Kevin is nowhere to be seen. 

Neil stops in the doorway. His muscles ache from more than his sprint; his shoulders heave harder than they should. Every beat his heart makes slams frantically against his ribs.  _ Help. Help. Help—  _

“Andrew,” he chokes. “I—I need—”

 Andrew doesn’t wait for him to finish. He’s up in an instant, cigarette stubbed out on the sill. He crosses the room to stop inches from Neil. 

“I’m..” Neil tries again. His voice sticks in his throat. The bitter-sour flavor of his own lies threaten to make him ill. 

_ I’m fine,  _ a part of him hisses. He can see himself as he was so clearly—ragged and worn to pieces, a knife dulled until it only knows how to bludgeon. Bruises under his eyes; bruises on his arms and legs.  _ I’m fine. I’m fine. I don’t need any help. _

But that isn’t who he is. Not anymore.

He looks into Andrew’s eyes and draws their summer to his mind: walks by moonlight, dust trapped under wheels. Careful hands that taught him how to touch. 

_ Give me a sign,  _ Andrew’s eyes say. His face is blank, but the light underneath burns through with painful brilliance. He would kill for Neil, as Neil would for him. He would do anything.

_ Tell me what you need. _

“Andrew,” Neil tries again. His hands tremble uncontrollably; he clenches them into tight fists, burying them in his shirt. “I need..”

_ Give me a sign.  _

“I need help.”

Andrew waits.

“I need to leave.”

They look at each other. Andrew’s gaze sweeps him head-to-toe; his lips purse. “Now?”

“Now,” Neil echoes.  _ Please. _

His edges fray as they walk to the car. He holds himself together almost literally—hands over his face, his arms, his abdomen. The heat plasters his shirt like a second skin, too thin to hide from the world in.

“Drive?” Andrew asks. 

“No,” Neil replies. He doesn’t know if he can. Not right now.

Asphalt and earth shred under the Maserati’s squealing tires. They race for the highway, the freeway, any way that will take Neil out from under his cloud’s shadows. The sky hands heavy with unspilled rain; static electric clings to every surface. Neil  _ inhales, exhales,  _ just the way Andrew taught him, and feels the air’s weight press his lungs flat.

They make it twenty miles out before the heavens open up.

Fat raindrops shatter over the windshield. Lightning snaps across black clouds, rippling in white-hot needlepoints against the hills around them. Neil rolls down the window and sticks his head out, feeling the sky splash over his cheeks, his hair, his scars. 

Goosebumps raise every inch of his skin. He feels—strange, as if he’s suddenly grown two feet overnight, stretching up and out to fill his body. He’s horribly grounded, horribly  _ awake _ , awareness hammering into his bones with every heartbeat.

He’ll never be able to outrun who he was.  _ I’m fine  _ is tattooed on his heart, a scar a foot wide and nineteen years thick. He won’t be able to shed his habits so easily.

But it’s worth a shot to try.

“I’m going to be fine,” Neil whispers. The wind swallows his words and chews them to pieces.

He pulls himself back into his seat. Andrew rolls up the window silently. He doesn’t even look at Neil, but the unspoken question hangs between them.

“I’m not fine,” Neil tells him. The words hurt coming out—a bittersweet relief. The trap of his ribs opens up and eases his lungs to breathe. His heart races; tears prickle with the rain. “Not yet.”

Andrew doesn’t say anything, but one hand snakes out and curls around Neil’s neck, resting against his pulse. He fills the silence with unspoken words.

_ You will be. _

**Author's Note:**

> Not too holiday festive, but the angst was hopefully everything you wished for. 
> 
> Happy holidays Theo (and everyone else)!


End file.
